There is an unsolved need to collect large amounts of solar energy without causing a large negative impact to the local environment where the energy is collected. Some current solar energy collection technologies collect energy for personal use by mounting photovoltaic solar panels on the rooftops of homes or other buildings. These technologies are fine for personal use but they are restricted to collecting relatively small amounts of energy (50 kilowatts or less). Other current solar energy collection technologies collect large amounts of solar energy (one megawatt to several hundred megawatts) by converting large tracts of land into solar farms. These large installations make a major negative environmental impact on the land they occupy. In addition, large installations require the energy they generate to be transported to the cities where it is needed via new transmission lines. These new transmission lines are costly and have a further negative impact on the environment.
What is needed is a means to collect large amounts of solar energy in cities where the energy is used in a manner that improves and beautifies the local environment and has positive environmental externalities.
A second unsolved problem in the areas of the world which have intense sunshine is that many public and private open spaces are underutilized because the sun makes it uncomfortable for people to use those spaces during much of the year. It is too expensive to provide large amounts of shade for those areas. Additionally, many of the plants native to those areas would thrive in the shade if it could be provided.
What is needed is a cost effective means to provide shade for large public and private open spaces to make the spaces more comfortable for people to use. Furthermore, the shade should be provided in a manner that allows plants to flourish.
A third unsolved problem is that the large parking lots in cities with intense sunshine absorb large amounts of heat from the sun and then later reemit that heat. This absorbing and reemitting of heat is known as the heat island effect and makes the cities hotter during the day and hotter longer into the evening. Examples are large asphalt or concrete parking lots such as are typically found near shopping centers and large business areas.
What is needed is a cost effective means to reduce the heat absorbed by the large asphalt parking lots from the sun and thereby reduce the heat island effect in cities with intense sunshine.
A fourth unsolved problem is a way to minimize the area required to collect solar energy. Typically, once solar is installed on a tract of land the land cannot be used for anything else or has only limited uses. The land is generally fully occupied by being a solar collection facility. Further when the solar panels are placed near the ground, access roads and paths must be created consuming additional land area. Also, the placement of central inverters and other necessary transmission equipment takes up even more land. Finally the solar panels generally need to be set back away from nearby tall objects such as trees, fences or buildings on adjacent land in order to function efficiently.
What is needed are systems, methods and structures for minimizing the amount of land required to collect solar energy and further what is needed are systems, methods and structures for allowing the land dedicated to collecting solar energy to be simultaneously used for other purposes.
A fifth unsolved problem is the cost of solar energy. Simply put solar energy costs much more to produce than tradition methods of generating electricity. Thus, a means is needed to reduce or offset the cost of solar energy produced.
Moreover, a sixth unsolved problem is the need to protect electrical components (associated with solar energy generation) from people and people from those electrical components, while also facilitating convenient access to the electrical components for maintenance. There is also a need for more efficient distribution of the power generated by the solar energy structures.